Translinc happy to take charge of the fleet

Many of TransLinc's contracts involve overseeing a council's entire fleet, even if some vehicles are hired from other providers. This enables a superior service

TransLinc says it is relatively atypical, in that its fleet management services extend across all of its local authority contracts, not just those that pay for the service in isolation. Many of the company's contracts involve overseeing the entire local authority fleet, even on framework agreements where some vehicles have been supplied or hired from other providers.

By doing this, the company says it can keep an eye on the local authority's entire fleet and ensures workshop staff keep on top of key safety issues, such as six or eight week maintenance inspections or MOTs. Mark Werrell, TransLinc's national sales manager, explains further.

All eyes on the fleet"Where a fleet management solution is required, it's important that someone keeps an overall eye on the fleet. More often than not it becomes our responsibility to manage all aspects of the vehicle operation, from sourcing and maintaining vehicles, to helping support the running of the workshops.

"That way our systems can flag up any key issues with workshop procedures, rogue vehicles or proactively plan for when something like a refuse collection vehicle is going to be off the road."

An authority's workshop sits at the heart of a successful fleet management strategy. TransLinc says it works, as far as possible, with a council's workshop to utilise its convenient location and the expertise of its staff in maintaining such specialised vehicles.

Within a proactive workshop, scheduling sits side-by-side with spot hire, the short-term hire of a vehicle, thus ensuring a specialist vehicle such as an RCV - which can often be difficult to replace - is flagged up as needing a major service and a replacement found in good time.

Spot hire is an essential service for local authorities, due to the specialised nature of the vehicles they operate. In the case of RCVs, the daily tasks performed by these vehicles are vital to the local community. Therefore, should a replacement be required due to a vehicle failure, authorities using a fleet management service can access a spot hire facility.

This essentially provides a brokering service between local authorities and the major spot hire companies, providing the requested vehicle within 24 to 48 hours. Authorities can benefit from better hire terms due to the relationship between a company such as TransLinc and spot hire vehicle providers.

"Keeping vehicles on the road is part of our challenge," says Werrell. "We have introduced small items into some authorities which have cost pounds, but reduced vehicle-off-the-road times quite considerably. A good example is fitting LED lights to RCVs. If an LED light fuses, you have plenty more to keep your vehicle legal, whereas if a standard bulb fuses, your vehicle needs to be taken off the road immediately for the light to be fixed."

Staying alertThe workshop also plays a key role in any legal or technical advice and support that TransLinc has fed into an authority. This area has been particularly busy in the past six to 12 months, with a plethora of legislation being introduced, from blind spot mirrors and digital tachographs, to speed limiters and the working time directive.

Translinc says that local authorities rely on it to keep them one step ahead of all these key issues.